


seems like a mighty long time

by zealotarchaeologist



Category: Death Stranding (Video Games)
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, M/M, One-sided because cliff is an angry ghost not because it wasnt real, Pining, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-13
Updated: 2019-12-13
Packaged: 2021-02-24 16:21:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,411
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21780865
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zealotarchaeologist/pseuds/zealotarchaeologist
Summary: This wraith of a man both is and is not his captain.
Relationships: Die-Hardman/Clifford Unger
Comments: 8
Kudos: 97





	seems like a mighty long time

**Author's Note:**

> takes place after the scene on amelie's beach because the game really...did not explain what happens to diehardman after that
> 
> i want to write some extremely normal fic where they just go on a nice dinner date and nothing bad happens but right now................my heart is still broken.......................................

For a moment, it’s like being back on the battlefield. In way over his head, but the moment he sees his captain rise up John knows everything’s going to be okay.

And then he’s back somewhere else altogether. It’s every nightmare he’s had since that day, over and over. Every person he loves is here, and in danger, and he can’t do anything about it. Ashen soldiers stalk around him, but he can’t move. The water is soaking through his suit, but he doesn’t care. Can’t make himself stand like he couldn’t make himself move then. His body like a leaden anchor, rendered useless.

Until Cliff pulls him up, just like before. Puts a gun to his head, just like before. Holds him back-to-chest, warm and steady despite it all and for a moment they’re walking down that hallway again.

“John,” he says, and it’s so strange to hear his normal voice. Calm and smooth, like none of this is happening. “Can I rely on you?”

God, he’d salute if he could move. “Of course, sir,” he manages, voice shaky from crying. “Always.”

The sand of the Beach gives way to the sand of the desert and then they’re back in time. Their old unit. The desert turns into bombed-out city, the city into jungle. Day to night and back again, again and again, sometimes in an instant. The air grows thick and heavy with moisture. John loses most of his suit somewhere along the way, his mask is long forgotten. Skeletal soldiers stalk the jungle around them and he wonders. If he looked harder, would he recognize the bones, the names on their tags?

All around them he hears screams. From the trees, the fields, the houses where they catch fire. Wherever they walk, everything burns. The percussion of propeller blades becomes the blistering rattle of a machine gun becomes a bullet that passes through his shoulder like a ghost. The pain of it is real, though, the memory of it flares up. He’s been shot there before. For the hundredth time he’d thought he was going to die and the captain had squeezed his hand tight before dragging him out of death’s jaws, once again.

War is hell. John knows this and doesn’t need to learn it twice. He wonders if this is where he’ll end up when he dies or if there’s something worse out there waiting for him in the afterlife, a place for the worst kind of coward.

He gives up asking questions fast. His captain has no answers, no explanations beyond the search for his stolen child. He doesn’t give up apologizing, though. Even though it does nothing for either of them. 

Time moves strangely on the Beach, but what John gathers is this: this wraith of a man both is and is not his captain.

Sometimes he’s his old self, intense and collected but always so warm. He laughs, and puts his arm around John, and doesn’t seem to remember—the president, the Beach, anything. Other times he is only the man that wants his child back, and he hunts with single-minded purpose. When he speaks, it is only to deliver his orders. When John tries to speak to him, he doesn’t seem to hear.

He’s at his most lucid when he’s somewhere in-between. As the sky gives way to eternal evening Cliff puts the gun down and beckons John to sit by him, shoulder to shoulder beside a crumbling barricade. The air hasn’t grown much cooler, but he can hardly help the shudder when they touch.

Cliff gives him an apologetic look and raises his hand. A cigarette sparks to life between his fingers, plucked from thin air.

He holds it to his lips, inhales with lungs that will never breathe real air again. A shadow going through the motions. Exhales and closes his eyes. The dead soldiers have taken up positions around them. In the growing dark, they glow like embers.

After everything that’s happened in the past—god, how long has it been—it’s strange to see the captain so relaxed. His gear removed, the top button of his shirt undone. His dog tags glint in the light of the sunset. When he opens his eyes, he offers up the cigarette.

“Only the one, I’m afraid.” He says, and John’s never been one for smoking but his hands shake as he takes it. He tries not to think about the taste but the action is enough to stir something in him, to rake up the coals of something he didn’t know was still burning. His hands shake worse when he passes it back.

The captain smokes in silence, looking out into the setting sun. How many nights did they spend like this, years ago? The captain watching out for them. John watching the captain.

He thinks about the hard, beautiful angles of Clifford Unger’s face. He thinks about the barrel of a gun.

He wants to fall to his knees again and apologize. He wants to plead until the captain tells him what the hell’s going on. He wants to tell him about his _son_ , god, about how he’s grown up and how he was almost a father too and about how despite it all he’s always so kind, just like the captain. He wants to say just one true thing, just once in his entire life, to take the mask off and say just once what he really means, what he really feels--

“Did you ever have children, John?” Cliff turns to him with eyes that seem to look right through him, right into the heart of him. He always was good at catching out liars.

So John won’t lie. He’s well-practiced at saying just enough without really saying anything. “No, sir. Can’t say I ever wanted to.” _Seeing you and your baby shot put me off the idea, sir. I tried to take care of yours, though._

Cliff shakes his head. “It’s a shame. If you had, you might understand.” He smiles, softly, looking so damn apologetic about it all. Like he’s so sorry for dragging John into this, as if it’s not his own fault. As if he wouldn’t go willingly. “Ever fall in love?”

For a moment he’s afraid he’s been caught out. But then Cliff laughs, that genuine, loud laugh he’s always had, and claps him on the back. “The look on your face! No, you don’t need to answer that. I hope they treat you well, whoever they are.”

John ducks his head away from the smile, so kind it hurts. He doesn’t deserve it. _Everyone I’ve loved went and died on me and I was too much of a coward to do anything about it._ “Always do, sir.”

Time passes strangely on the Beach, John understands. War was the same way. The hours blur together into one long day, one long night. He can’t tell how long it’s been when Sam arrives.

He’s too far away to be seen, but the entire Beach changes. The sun drops low on the horizon. The air is still and tense in a way that’s intimately familiar: the enemy is near.

Captain Unger hunts, a predator in the tall grass. He is as graceful and ruthless as he ever was. He remembers the first time he saw the captain kill someone. How steady his eyes and hands were, how calm his voice.

They move like shadows through water, through fields. They hold utterly still positions in the trees, under the houses. The captain doesn’t look at him anymore. He’s only searching. His eyes scan the horizon for any shape, any sign of movement. John closes his eyes and stays behind cover, prays that Sam doesn’t come over the next hill.

This is all wrong. None of them should be here. He should be the one paying for all this, not Sam. “Captain.” Lost in his pain and anger, does he even understand who it is he’s looking for? “Sir, please listen, he’s—”

Cliff hushes him with a finger pressed to his lips. A hand resting on the nape of his neck. It steals his breath along with the words. The wind changes. Ash fills the air, and he knows he’s about to follow Clifford Unger into hell once again. Just one more time.

“Don’t be afraid, John, you’re one of mine. I’ll get you home safe.” His voice is far away, another time, another place. “I always do.”


End file.
